


A Degree of Captivity

by Hymn



Category: Loveless
Genre: Canon Divergent, M/M, M/S, Masturbation, Underage - Freeform, age gap, because i never finished reading the manga lol, it got out of hand, pls let me know if i missed a tag!, putting on a show, ritsuka thoughts, soubi being soubi, while someone is watching
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-07-19
Updated: 2007-07-19
Packaged: 2019-05-08 03:16:55
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14685306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hymn/pseuds/Hymn
Summary: When Ritsuka walks, he trails invisible chains behind him.





	A Degree of Captivity

**Author's Note:**

> for spk, Loveless, Ritsuka/Soubi: Looking as the other jerks off. "Stockholm syndrome."

The chains drape around him like a shroud of biting power, heavy and cold, and Ritsuka’s ears flick back against his head as they twist his arms up, immobile. Snow is falling, small white flakes of inconsequential cold drifting down; and through the pale, frozen rain, are their opponents. They’re nothing more than dark shadows beneath the streetlight, their movements sharp, frightened before the fight had even begun. 

Ritsuka feels nothing for them; he looks down at the chains trapping him and frowns a little, irritated more that he is becoming so used to this, than anything else. The night is a crystal, sharp clarity around him, and his breath makes clouds before his face as he says: “Soubi.”

“Yes, Master.”

Ritsuka twitches, just a little, and keeps his eyes on the shine the streetlight makes on the chains. He doesn’t need to kiss his Fighter anymore to strengthen the power between them; or, at least, he doesn’t think he does, so he ignores the urge to look up, because then he might lock eyes on Soubi’s through the biting air, and raise his head, blush and all, and demand a kiss without words. But it’s not necessary, so he doesn’t, just feels the cold night against his cheeks, his hands, through the fur of his ears and tail, and keeps his eyes down, on the chains.

“Break them,” he says, and barely hears Soubi’s murmured “Understood” through the falling of the snow.

It’s after the battle, when they’ve won and Soubi is pressing his nose against Ritsuka’s hair, with Ritsuka sighing faintly but letting him, hands resting not-quite-hesitantly against Soubi’s sides, that Ritsuka says, “Soubi,” once more.

“Ritsuka,” Soubi smoothes his smile out against Ritsuka’s temple, and Ritsuka huffs, knowing without seeing that it’s a smug pervert smile. 

Ritsuka grabs him by the collar of his shirt and tugs him down; this is familiar: Ritsuka has done this countless times, and the only difference is how far Soubi has to bend to stoop down to Ritsuka’s height, now. Soubi’s eyes are laughing and dark, and Ritsuka’s mouth twists, but all he does is say, “Don’t get any ideas,” before he kisses Soubi, hard, on the mouth. 

He lets him go before Soubi can get any ideas, because sometimes Soubi has an interesting concept of following orders. Then Ritsuka is turning away, stomping through the snow and the night, a flush going straight through him, warming him to his bones. It begins at his lips.

“Good night, Ritsuka,” Soubi calls, his voice a warm smoke-curl. Ritsuka just stomps harder.

*

At night, he lies in his bed, curled under the covers, half over the pillow. He watches the phone at his side, not waiting for anything in particular; he’s just looking, just thinking. His ceiling fan is a quiet whir overhead, and even though his computer is shut off, there’s a glare from the window that reflects off of it.

Ritsuka lies awake in his bed and thinks of Soubi.

He thinks: I wonder what he is doing right now; I wonder if he is at home in bed and sleeping – does he have class in the morning? – or if he is taking a bath to relax. I wonder if that battle wore him out; did he seem a little short of breath? A little more reluctant to let go of me? Or was that just him, just me? How long can I keep kissing him before he finally asks for more? Can he ask for more? Does he even know how? I want him to ask for more. I want him to wake up in the morning to a sun dazzled room, and find the world at peace, and not have a look in his eyes like he’s been left behind in some dark space. I wonder if he’s thinking of me right now, too.

Then Ritsuka thinks: I hate this.

He turns over, back to his phone; scrunches his eyes shut tight, curls up smaller than is comfortable, careful of his wounded hand, cradled tenderly to his chest. Eventually, he falls asleep.

*

When Ritsuka walks, he trails invisible chains behind him. His world holds him captive: he is a prisoner of circumstance and choice, and he feels the weight of this heavy across his shoulders, on his brow, encircling tight his chest. Sometimes he stands very still, imagining the clink and rattle of them settling at his feet, dragging him down, anchoring him to reality; and he looks out at the people walking through his world, brief visitors, brief interlopers, each caught up in their own life, and wonders: are their chains made up of light and glory, or are they dark things, memories of grief and strange entanglements that trip them up if they are not careful where they step?

Ritsuka snaps pictures on his camera, and each image is one more link on his chain, one more bar to his prison. 

*

Ritsuka sits perched on a stool in Soubi’s studio, his ears laid back, knuckles tight on the edge of the smooth wood grain. His tail fidgets between the slats of the long legs, his feet hooked casually behind them. He watches Soubi through narrow eyes, the room drafty because of the wide space, despite the heater that’s on too high.

He says, “You’re smothering me.”

Soubi frowns at whatever paint he’s just mixed onto his palette, and then looks up, through too long lashes, and asks, “Pardon?”

“Don’t be stupid,” Ritsuka mutters. “You can hear me perfectly well.”

Soubi smiles, then, and goes back to dabbing his brush into the mixture, and then spreading it across the canvas. His hand flows in slow, precise movements, his wrist very still, his fingers a gentle pressure around the slender handle. “I’m smothering you, am I?”

“Yes,” Ritsuka scowls. He doesn’t explain himself, but he has to say something. There’s an overwhelming pressure tightening mercilessly against him, rubbing tauntingly against whatever vulnerability is within reach. He thinks: if Soubi were to paint the chains that bind me, would they be in the arch of a butterfly wing, or would they lie in the form of an empty name, a title that introduced a lock and threw away the key? 

But Soubi has a habit of painting him wrong, of painting Ritsuka pure and clean and too beautiful for the fetid stench of his prison links; sometimes, looking at those paintings, Ritsuka thinks he’s still painting _Beloved_ instead of _Loveless_. Soubi’s hair is in a ponytail, and he is watching Ritsuka from veiled eyes, with that horrible smile of his, and Ritsuka glares.

Then Soubi puts down his palette, takes off his apron, and walks across the floor, over to Ritsuka. He pulls him in tight, holds him hard until Ritsuka thinks his ribs will break. Ritsuka refuses to return the embrace; “Let go of me.”

Soubi hugs him all the tighter, pressing Ritsuka’s face to his chest until Ritsuka has to press his hands hard against Soubi’s chest to get some air. He gasps, and then Soubi’s mouth is fleeting and jealous and broken against his. “Make me,” he whispers in the next moment, rubbing his cheek against Ritsuka’s hair, while Ritsuka is still shivering in surprise.

“Stupid,” Ritsuka mutters, and wraps his arms around Soubi’s waist, and holds him there, in a cradle of chains, in a trap of their own making. Ritsuka closes his eyes against they way they fit together, not right and jagged and exactly what he doesn’t want. Ritsuka holds Soubi tighter, presses the pieces of them closer, and reiterates, “Stupid, stupid Soubi.”

*

Ritsuka lies awake at night, and rubs against a spot of paint that accidentally dried on him. Soubi is ruining his sleep, and Ritsuka glares at his phone as if that will fix anything. He has three tests tomorrow, and he’s slept through the last two review sessions. 

But Ritsuka rests his cheek against his pillow, while snow drifts quietly on the outside of his window, his fan on because Ritsuka likes the sound, even if it makes him shiver beneath his blankets. He’s thinking again, and what he’s thinking is: Who is the captor and who is the captive? He’s the adult, he should be the responsible one and take the blame, but Soubi is so- so stupid, and he doesn’t know how to take care of himself, and sometimes I have to tell him off for being stupid, and tell him things like it’s okay to have a nightmare, and all I really want to do is press my hand against his face and watch him breathing. Who surrendered to the other first? Who actually started believing the lie, started caring and wanting and feeling? Who started to live the lie so that it broke us open and left us like this, bleeding into each other and never quite enough? When did I stop hating him for making everything more complicated, and when did I start hating the people who made him believe that living in a world pinned down under glass was the only option?

When did I start to understand, and why don’t I understand enough?

*

Then Ritsuka follows Soubi home one night, and the Zeroes had moved out years ago so it’s empty, just them, and the steam from his hot chocolate curls up slowly in the night. Ritsuka tucks his feet up beneath him in the corner of Soubi’s bed. “I’m in high school now,” he tells Soubi, who is barefoot and lazily sprawled in a chair at a table, one hand resting longingly over a half-empty pack of cigarettes. 

Ritsuka glares at that hand, and Soubi moves it away with a smile; stops touching his nicotine craving and turns to Ritsuka to distract himself, instead. “Are you?” he asks, amused. “I never noticed.”

“Hmph.” Ritsuka takes a sip of hot chocolate, and breathes a happy sigh. It’s a little too bitter, the chocolate dark, and it’s perfect and hot, and smoothes down his throat and into his stomach in a wave of blessed heat. His cheeks are still cold from the winter air of their long walk back from the park.

“Are you staying the night?” Soubi asks, with a carefully practiced nonchalance, and Ritsuka narrows his eyes at him. 

“Maybe.”

Soubi smiles, and rises, goes to his dresser and pulls out a t-shirt and boxers; lays them out on the table and sits back down. “As you like. But if you want to change-”

“Come here,” Ritsuka interrupts, his hands curled tight and careful around the mug. Soubi blinks long and slow behind his glasses. He tucks a lock of long soft hair behind his ear, rises, and comes to Ritsuka, presses his knees against his mattress and hugs himself so that he doesn’t come any closer. Soubi raises an eyebrow, and it almost says more than words could; Ritsuka is blushing, but says, “On the bed, Soubi.”

There’s a faint smile on Soubi’s face, and he hesitates just a bare moment, enough for his deep voice to sketch the words “Is that an order?” out between them.

“Yes,” Ritsuka says, not quite able to look at Soubi directly. “Yes it is an order.”

Soubi shivers, and gets on the bed. “Sir?” he teases, once he’s there, and Ritsuka gives him a look, but doesn’t say anything. He hunches his shoulders, and thinks: I want this. I can give him this. This, at least, even if I can’t give him more. He needs this. Even if it’s not fair, I think I understand, a little. Maybe.

There are no chains or manacles that lock Ritsuka in place here, now; nothing to give example to the strange way that Ritsuka and Soubi are both prisoner and warden to this strange relationship. But Ritsuka feels it all the same, and the invisible chains unfurl like a flower, and Ritsuka tells Soubi, “I- I want to watch you.”

Soubi goes very still. He breathes in, sharp, and says, “Ritsuka.” A smile. “Silly Ritsuka, you don’t need my permission for that.”

“No,” says Ritsuka. He swallows, blushing, determined. “No, stupid. I- I want you t-to touch. Um. Yourself.” He looks down, bites his lip; the hot chocolate in his mug trembles just a little, rippling at the monumental moment the world is stretched out in, sharp and bright and on a knife’s edge. That pressure is pounding through Ritsuka, and he whispers, “Do it. Let me watch.”

There’s a long moment of silence, and then Soubi’s voice is a quiet, wicked shadow slipping through the air, saying, “How are you going to watch me masturbate if you can’t even look at me now?”

“Soubi!” Ritsuka exclaims, jerking his gaze up to his smirking Fighter, who laughs, and sits there as innocently as Soubi can ever do anything, fingers lax in the sheets of his bed. “I- You-!”

“Maybe when you’re older, Ritsuka,” Soubi says gently, and Ritsuka sucks in his breath, glares furiously, because…because maybe it’s Soubi’s fault in the first place for telling Ritsuka he loved him in the very beginning, and maybe Ritsuka shouldn’t care, because Soubi was following Seimei’s orders, Soubi was wrapping invisible chains around Ritsuka’s neck in the guise of freedom. But Ritsuka does, and this is where they are, now, together and maybe the revelation of Seimei was just one more chain tying them together, rather than a freedom, but Ritsuka’s used to thinking in warped perspectives, by now.

“It’s an order, Soubi,” he says, still glaring because if he doesn’t he thinks he’ll just start blushing and try to hide behind his mug and never, ever stop. Soubi’s eyes are too beautiful and broken to never look into again, though, so Ritsuka glares, ears flat, tail a tight ripple of agitation behind him, and doesn’t let his own insecurities cow him, this time.

“Ritsuka…”

“No,” Ritsuka says. “Shut up! Stop worrying about things for once, and just _listen_ to me. Just- You’d think that when you finally get just what you want, you’d be more grateful, stupid. Jeez.” He chews his lip ferociously, waiting for Soubi’s next move. 

Soubi lets out a slow breath, and slides one hand back behind him, his legs uncurling slowly, his other hand twitching beside him. The expression on his face hurts, like Ritsuka is cruel for doing this, but then Soubi closes his eyes, and Ritsuka says once more, “T-touch yourself for me. That’s an order.” and Soubi’s hand is moving as if Ritsuka’s words have given it life, and Soubi’s voice is a faint warm shiver of surrender as he says, “Yes, sir.”

It should probably be more awkward, but it’s hard to really concentrate on that with Soubi beautiful and needy in front of him. He hasn’t taken off his glasses, but Ritsuka doesn’t say anything – can’t say anything, lest it break the moment. Soubi’s breath is coming slow, even, and he opens up his pants, and slides them down his thighs with the ease of long practice. He’s half hard, already, a long pale arch of rigid flesh, and Ritsuka knows his face is on fire, but he can’t look away, either.

He curls up around his mug, and watches, eyes dark and hungry and devouring, as Soubi slides his fingers down his length, curls them loosely around his cock and begins to lightly fist himself, smoothing the pads of his fingers along the vein, rubbing over the slit, massaging down at the root. Ritsuka watches all with a rapt attention, his hot chocolate going cold, his heart pounding.

“Faster, Soubi,” he murmurs and doesn’t even realize it until Soubi’s breath catches and his wrist moves quicker. Ritsuka swallows, sees the way Soubi shudders, and says, “Tighter.”

Soubi gasps, and his fingers nearly spasm on his cock, tightening and pulling against what is now a full erection, proud and weeping between his spread thighs. Ritsuka is barely breathing, a roaring in his ears. His skin is stretched too tight over his skeleton, and he feels trapped and powerful and scared all at once; he never wants this moment to stop.

“Soubi,” he says. “I want to hear you, too. It- It’s an order.”

The moan that Ritsuka receives is immediate and raw, broken and hungry. Ritsuka smiles without meaning to, and Soubi’s eyes slit open, dark purple and lost, and Ritsuka tightens his legs, curls up over the throb he feels in his own pants, the erection he knows is there. “Master,” Soubi says on a slow, lewd moan, and Ritsuka shivers sharply, and says, “Yes. Yes.”

Soubi is getting closer, face flushed beautiful, sweat beginning to stick his hair in gleaming strands around his face; he is panting, the arm holding him up trembling, and he spreads his legs wider, his cock red and leaking as he jerks himself off. Ritsuka bites his lip, hard, scrunching his eyes closed on a tiny whimper. The pressure is so fierce Ritsuka thinks he will explode, knows he will, even untouched, like this, just watching.

“Master,” says Soubi’s low, needing voice, “Master you said- Ritsuka you said you would-”

“I’m watching,” Ritsuka snaps, with open eyes. “I’m watching, Soubi. N-now. C…come for me.”

Soubi swallows, a shaky smile on his face, his glasses slipping down his nose, and he makes a noise almost like a whine in the back of his throat, bucking into his fist and coming, his seed spilling everywhere, splashing him and his bed; Ritsuka stops breathing when a strand lands on his knee, but then he’s distracted by Soubi giving a long, hard shudder, sighing like he’s just woken from a most beautiful dream.

“Soubi…”

Soubi smiles peacefully, lazily, hand still curled loosely around his softening cock. There’s come on his glasses, and Ritsuka’s hands hurt from their hold on his mug. “Yes, sir?”

Ritsuka bites his lip. Then he scoots to the edge of the bed, stands awkwardly, and begins a shuffle into the bathroom, still curved awkwardly around his mug. “Stay out here!” he demands. “Don’t come after me! A-and. Clean yourself up!”

Soubi laughs softly, and swipes at some of his ejaculation; licks it off with a wicked gleam in satiated eyes, and murmurs, “Understood.”

Ritsuka closes the bathroom door behind him, leans back against it, and muffles his cry with a fist in his mouth when he presses the palm of his other hand against his tented jeans.

*

Maybe it’s not healthy, and maybe he probably shouldn’t, but Ritsuka can’t help but glory in his captivity, in someone who gives his world an awkward, strained definition, too harsh and bold and messily glorious. And maybe he shouldn’t indulge Soubi, maybe Ritsuka should hate him, should rail against Soubi for whispering those first words of I love you and kissing him and drawing him into a corner where his inexperience could try and box him in.

But he doesn’t, annoyingly enough, and maybe Ritsuka’s been around Soubi too long, now, because he thinks he’s starting to get him, starting to understand him as if this is a real relationship. When Ritsuka lets himself lie awake at night, and stare at his phone, and think, he can’t help that his thinking runs along the lines of the fact that he’s viciously satisfied with that.


End file.
